"2nd Curtain" flash syncronization with Copal-type Shutter

**Larry Huppert** · 8-Dec-1998, 00:10

I'm familar with the ability to set-off flash on the closing of a shutter. Is t here an easy way to do this with LF shutters?

**Brian Yarvin** · 8-Dec-1998, 11:21

A guy in Virgina makes a device call the "Ghostmaster" that does exactly this. It works fine with my veiw camera shutters and my Fuji MF camera.

I bought mine at Flash Clinic in NYC, but other pro dealers might sell them too. It's a great little device.

**Alan Gibson** · 8-Dec-1998, 14:18

Brian, it sounds like a useful gadget. Can you tell us how it works? Is a piece of electronics that sits between the camera and flash, delaying the flash (fairly cheap?), or is it a mechanical thing that fits on the shutter somehow (more expensively)?

**Ellis Vener** · 8-Dec-1998, 16:27

You can alos do this with the big brother to the popular Pocket Wizard digital r adio remote, the Flash Wizard made by LPA. This unit will allow you to set the a mount of delay before the sync signal is sent so that you can have the strobe fi re at any point (measured in milliseconds during the exposure. Not Cheap, about US$900.00, but there are a lot more features to it.

Alternatively a good electronics shop should be able to build you some kind of a djustable delay trigger. For instance if you are shooting a 1/15th second the de lay should be on the order of 1/20th second, but you have to figure in triggers signal transmission and triggger signal processing by the flash.

If my exposures are 1/2 second or longer I often just trigger by using my hand o n a trigger button either on a sync cable,the test button of a small flash (usin g a slave on the big strobe) or th test button on my Pocket Wizard.